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Antivehicular posted:Yeah, the AR plot actually being about the FF14 setting for the first time since Heavensward is doing a lot of heavy lifting for me. this is definitely the best part about the narrative. the fights are good as always thankfully. the second one's fights are a bit toothless comparatively but mostly fine. i wish nophica had a mechanic that just loving Kills You like byregot had though.
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Aug 25, 2023 04:37
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Mordiceius posted:I'd love for there to be some reveals in the 3rd act that really mix things up, but I don't see that happening. They seem to be lingering on the whole "ooooh what is Deryk's mystery?!?!?!!?" but I just don't care. The consequence is that the fights are cool. Like I get it isn't an epic battle for the life of the planet but the WoL is someone who canonically just likes having really cool fights too. You have multiple really cool fights just for the sake of having cool fights throughout the MSQ. This is just "we're having a cool fight to have a cool fight" on a godly scale. I don't mind 'this fight is just for the sake of having fun' because those can be cool. The fight against Venat in Elpis for example is a highlight of EW to me and that's the least consequential fight ever.
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Aug 25, 2023 04:37
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Mordiceius posted:I don't mean to be a wet blanket but am the only one that finds the EW 24man storyline tremendously loving boring? For me it's reached the point where I'm no longer interested in the base concept, so that's lost its nkvelty, but it hasn't entered the point where it throws a curveball and brings something new. I think there's a problem that it's a concept where people already have favorites. We already have personal favorite members of the Twelve, either for conceptual reasons or just 'this is the one I picked in character creation'. So if your favorite is Nald'thal or Nophica, you're kinda already done, what else is in there for you? And the fact they're not exactly getting equal treatment doesn't really help; my favorite is Althyk, and Althyk's such a whimper of a boss that he's barely even a highlight of his own fight. I think it's also hurt pretty bad by the fact the game's default difficulty is 'you can do it when stoned and half-asleep': they're such pushovers that the bosses don't get to make a strong impression, which is a problem with a story like this where the bosses are sort of the whole point. There's not even Extreme or Savage versions for people to tell me to do if I want a challenge. EDIT: Forgot that this was the spoiler thread, so I don't need to spoiler-tag things! Cleretic fucked around with this message at 04:44 on Aug 25, 2023 |
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Aug 25, 2023 04:40
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Antivehicular posted:Yeah, the AR plot actually being about the FF14 setting for the first time since Heavensward is doing a lot of heavy lifting for me. see, that's the issue with it. it's about the FF14 setting but it's not adding anything substantial or doing simultaneous payoff-setup like ivalice did. it's purely answering questions that were raised very long ago and not really addressed since. pandaemoinum is doing that and simultaneously setting up neat hooks since the heart of sabik isn't fully off the table, the true nature of ultima is still pretty obscure, etc. ivalice, even though it's ff12 fanfic, is also grafting that onto 14 and setting up more things within that section of 14. it led to bozja, and bozja also left inconclusive things that can spark other stories.
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Aug 25, 2023 04:41
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Cleretic posted:For me it's reached the point where I'm no longer interested in the base concept, so that's lost its nkvelty, but it hasn't entered the point where it throws a curveball and brings something new. i know i judge the writing of a story based on how many times I died in the fight leading up to it
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Aug 25, 2023 04:45
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ImpAtom posted:The consequence is that the fights are cool. Contemplating on this further - I think, for me, one problem with the way the EW 24mans are structured is that they feel more like 8man structure. They don't feel like they have any sense of place. With 8man raids, I expect that every new boss in the raid is going to probably have a semi-unique setting and there (often) won't be connective tissue between those two boss arenas. Something like the Eden raid is the most extreme in this. But Omega does it as well. Pandaemonium actually felt like it tried to keep things connected. In the 24mans, I want to feel like I'm in a "place" where everything is connected. I think that the Stormblood Alliance raid is actually one of the best with this. There is a big sense of scale and moving through the environment. With the EW 24mans, you fight a boss, move forward and then gently caress it, it the whole scenery changes and there's no connective tissue. We might as well just spend the entire raid on the Star Trek Holodeck. I like a sense of place and these 24mans aren't giving me that.
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Aug 25, 2023 04:45
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Cleretic posted:For me it's reached the point where I'm no longer interested in the base concept, so that's lost its nkvelty, but it hasn't entered the point where it throws a curveball and brings something new. 2. Maybe there will be an even bigger mommi
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Aug 25, 2023 04:45
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Shadows of Mhach was such a wet fart of a story that Ivalice was more interesting for me solely for fleshing out Garlemald and Dalmasca (XIV).
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Aug 25, 2023 04:46
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flatluigi posted:i know i judge the writing of a story based on how many times I died in the fight leading up to it If a boss fight is so easy that it can't even get through all its mechanics before dying, and the story is explicitly about 'here's an opportunity to finally interact with these longstanding powerful figures (by violence because we know what this game is)', then the story isn't effectively being told, unless the story's intention is to show that the Twelve are actually total wimps.
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Aug 25, 2023 04:49
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Cleretic posted:For me it's reached the point where I'm no longer interested in the base concept, so that's lost its nkvelty, but it hasn't entered the point where it throws a curveball and brings something new. I completely agree. For me, it's been a whole lot of "What's the point?" We haven't really learned anything that wasn't already heavily speculated. "The Twelve are Venat's co-conspirators" has been the #1 theory since what? 5.1? And if the answer to "What's the point?" is "The fights themselves!" then it's going to fall extremely flat for someone like me who doesn't actually care about majority of the fights in this game and honestly finds fighting to be one of the dullest parts of the game.
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Aug 25, 2023 04:50
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Mordiceius posted:When it comes to the Alliance Raids, it's interesting because my ratings are slightly different based on the story vs the gameplay. This has to be a troll. There is no story in the ShB alliance raid.
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Aug 25, 2023 04:50
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Orcs and Ostriches posted:This has to be a troll. There is no story in the ShB alliance raid. The ShB alliance raid is a story of how grief and trauma can make enemies of neighbors and tear communities apart. Which is more story than the EW alliance raids have given us.
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Aug 25, 2023 04:52
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Cleretic posted:If a boss fight is so easy that it can't even get through all its mechanics before dying, and the story is explicitly about 'here's an opportunity to finally interact with these longstanding powerful figures (by violence because we know what this game is)', then the story isn't effectively being told, unless the story's intention is to show that the Twelve are actually total wimps. Do the alliance raids for the first time on launch day early on before everyone knows the mechanics. Because I promise you you'll see people eat poo poo repeatedly. I always do it as a healer and it's pretty common to have to pick up entirely groups after any potentially confusing mechanic.
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Aug 25, 2023 04:52
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I'm not sure I would consider "getting beaten up by 24 fighters at the level of the post-EW WoL, a person who has literally walked to the end of the universe and punched the poo poo out of the world-ending embodiment of despair" synonymous with "is a wimp," especially since they're clearly treating these as fun sparring matches and yielding before any serious harm befalls them
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Aug 25, 2023 04:53
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ImpAtom posted:Do the alliance raids for the first time on launch day early on before everyone knows the mechanics. Because I promise you you'll see people eat poo poo repeatedly. I always do it as a healer and it's pretty common to have to pick up entirely groups after any potentially confusing mechanic. This was not the case with Euphro to be fair. Euphro is a complete joke and always has been.
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Aug 25, 2023 04:54
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Failboattootoot posted:This was not the case with Euphro to be fair. Euphro is a complete joke and always has been. It absolutely was. People ate poo poo against Nophica and Halone. I remember Nophica in particular because I was the only healer up for a while. It wasn't punishingly super hard (no AR is) but there were plenty of deaths.
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Aug 25, 2023 04:55
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Antivehicular posted:I'm not sure I would consider "getting beaten up by 24 fighters at the level of the post-EW WoL, a person who has literally walked to the end of the universe and punched the poo poo out of the world-ending embodiment of despair" synonymous with "is a wimp," especially since they're clearly treating these as fun sparring matches and yielding before any serious harm befalls them So you're saying that Nald'thal dying before they even get to do the scales mechanic is actually good design and storytelling. EDIT: Also, I did do the alliance raids day one, despite hating to do alliance raids day 1 (there's eight months between them, I keep forgetting). 'This fight was challenging for literally one day' is not an effective argument to 'these fights are so easy that they fail to tell their story and sell the boss'.
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Aug 25, 2023 04:56
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Failboattootoot posted:This was not the case with Euphro to be fair. Euphro is a complete joke and always has been. Halone got my group a few times, as did Althyk + Nymeia, but that was it. Cleretic posted:So you're saying that Nald'thal dying before they even get to do the scales mechanic is actually good design and storytelling. Everyone knows the way that ilvl scaling actually works for Alliance Raids is bad, since they well, don't. You're allowed to be the maximum possible ilvl for the content level rather than something sensible (like maxing out at the ilvl it rewards). That doesn't make it bad design or storytelling, just a repeated issue that they haven't put the time in to fix and likely never will. But also that doesn't stop the best version of an Alliance Raid being day one when nobody has gear or knows mechanics so the fights actually exist, and you're never going to replicate that experience regardless of the gear scaling. Lord_Magmar fucked around with this message at 04:59 on Aug 25, 2023 |
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Aug 25, 2023 04:56
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HW had me on an airship and punching the devil and his girlfriend or something, I'm sure I'm missing the exact particulars but then I beat up the super devil and that was cool and a sky pirate wanted to be my friend Best raids
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Aug 25, 2023 04:56
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Failboattootoot posted:This was not the case with Euphro to be fair. Euphro is a complete joke and always has been. Yeah. There were dozens of deaths on day 1, sure, but measuring against other raids' hundreds of deaths and a multiple healer LBs per fight. My early puppets bunker, tower of paradigm's, and Agalaia were still in the 300+ deaths range days later when ACT was working again. My first Euphro was a cakewalk in comparison, and never reached that death counter. Euphro being considerably easier than the other raids isn't a localized opinion either.
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Aug 25, 2023 04:57
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Cleretic posted:So you're saying that Nald'thal dying before they even get to do the scales mechanic is actually good design and storytelling. You are judging the mechanics based on everyone being overgeared and already knowing the mechanics?
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Aug 25, 2023 04:57
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The Ivalice raids had what could/should have been an interesting story but it was presented by the horrendously annoying theater family, still I think they're the three best Alliance Raids to actually do.
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Aug 25, 2023 04:59
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Cleretic posted:So you're saying that Nald'thal dying before they even get to do the scales mechanic is actually good design and storytelling. This is like saying that every given cutscene is bad storytelling because you could theoretically do them in an elephant suit. It's always possible for player action to undercut story beats, especially if the player action in question is "become more powerful and skilled so the content is easier."
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Aug 25, 2023 05:02
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I think so many of my complaints of the EW raids would be less if it was just an interesting setting.
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Aug 25, 2023 05:05
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ImpAtom posted:It absolutely was. People ate poo poo against Nophica and Halone. I remember Nophica in particular because I was the only healer up for a while. It wasn't punishingly super hard (no AR is) but there were plenty of deaths. My week 1 run had 1 wipe to Halone. I didn't see another wipe until week 3 against Halone again. No wipes since.
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Aug 25, 2023 05:06
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Failboattootoot posted:My week 1 run had 1 wipe to Halone. I didn't see another wipe until week 3 against Halone again. No wipes since. I do the runs literally at server launch so maybe that colors things. I kind of hate waiting to do them because I don't like someone explaining all the mechanics to me which inevitably happens if I wait.
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Aug 25, 2023 05:06
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I've noticed a lot of people are just down on the post EW stories in general. Less so panda, but both the alliance raids and MSQ get a lot of negative discussion. I've enjoyed all three tbh, respecting though that the 24 is a low stakes tournament arc.
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Aug 25, 2023 05:07
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Cleretic posted:So you're saying that Nald'thal dying before they even get to do the scales mechanic is actually good design and storytelling. This point is stupid on the face of it and I don't think you're dumb enough to not know that.
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Aug 25, 2023 05:10
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Orcs and Ostriches posted:I've noticed a lot of people are just down on the post EW stories in general. Less so panda, but both the alliance raids and MSQ get a lot of negative discussion. msq is better than alliance raids, but it's still too little story for too much content. it feels like there are filler quests in a similar way to post-ARR and that's not a good place to be in
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Aug 25, 2023 05:14
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I was pretty okay with the 6.1-6.3 MSQ pacing (playing through it on release, at least -- no idea if it'll feel clunky played straight through), but 6.4 really feels like they're artificially stretching the story out. I hope they find a way to tie things up satisfyingly in 6.5 and that they manage to get something out of "you kicked Golbez's rear end, but not" in the process.
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Aug 25, 2023 05:20
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ImpAtom posted:You are judging the mechanics based on everyone being overgeared and already knowing the mechanics? No, I'm judging the fight and mechanics--and again, story, because this is a story that puts its weight on its bosses more than any other raid series--based on the fact that they've ALWAYS been pushovers to the point where they fail to even show all their tricks. Nald'thal's just reached a particularly egregious point. Althyk and Nymeia die before they can even get their time-warped card reading out, and that's been happening since maybe week 3. I thought this was widely recognized as a problem with Euphrosyne in particular, that the bosses literally don't have enough HP? A storyline all about rad boss fights needs the boss fights to put up more of a fight than this.
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Aug 25, 2023 05:20
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FuturePastNow posted:The Ivalice raids had what could/should have been an interesting story but it was presented by the horrendously annoying theater family, still I think they're the three best Alliance Raids to actually do. They kept adding interesting characters too, but they kept going back to the boring people.
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Aug 25, 2023 05:22
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I don't think I ever saw a wipe in Aglaia to anything other than the scales, but Rhalgr's portal punch and the ball drop were both killing significant numbers of people for weeks after release. I only saw one wipe in Euphrosyne, on day one when we failed Halone's add phase. Euphro is definitely the easiest alliance raid and I hope they punish us for it in the third one.
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Aug 25, 2023 05:22
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With all due respect, Cleretic, it sounds like you're kind of just bored of normal-difficulty content at this point. Have you considered taking a break from the game? Or, I dunno, getting really into PotD or something?
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Aug 25, 2023 05:23
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Cleretic posted:A storyline all about rad boss fights needs the boss fights to put up more of a fight than this. At the end of the day, this is true. I think most people want ilvl limits on everything from story trial bosses, to 8/24 player raid bosses. Earlier tiers are completely clowned on once the gear updates and I don't know if anyone really enjoys it.
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Aug 25, 2023 05:27
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Orcs and Ostriches posted:Earlier tiers are completely clowned on once the gear updates and I don't know if anyone really enjoys it. One counterpoint is that they keep requiring currency of earlier tiers for later tomestone upgrades so by the time you reach x.5, you will have likely run the first tier 3x as much as the latest tier and oof if couldn't be clowned.
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Aug 25, 2023 05:29
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Cleretic posted:
As always with these complaints with you Cleretic, we get back to "Normal mode/entry content is too easy" and I have bad news about the answer to that complaint.
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Aug 25, 2023 05:30
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People don't enjoy their trial roulette taking 20 minutes
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Aug 25, 2023 05:32
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Mordiceius posted:One counterpoint is that they keep requiring currency of earlier tiers for later tomestone upgrades so by the time you reach x.5, you will have likely run the first tier 3x as much as the latest tier and oof if couldn't be clowned. It'd still be significantly easier. Aglaia was released with 565 minumum, compared to the 600 savage BIS/maximum. The difference between those two ilvls is still quite significant, and it's probably a good middle ground between grueling with pubbies and kill boss before their signature attack.
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Aug 25, 2023 05:34
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Orcs and Ostriches posted:It'd still be significantly easier. Aglaia was released with 565 minumum, compared to the 600 savage BIS/maximum. The difference between those two ilvls is still quite significant, and it's probably a good middle ground between grueling with pubbies and kill boss before their signature attack. I feel like there needs to be a better system for casual tomestone upgrade than "run all 3 raids for a single upgrade" at the final tier.
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Aug 25, 2023 05:39
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